Share this story

Yesterday, federal prosecutors unsealed a new indictment against former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort. The indictment contains new evidence that Manafort hid millions of dollars in overseas income from US authorities, and it charges Manafort and his associate Richard Gates with numerous counts of tax and bank fraud.

The indictment also suggests that Manafort's lack of technology savvy helped prosecutors build a case against Manafort and Gates. The pair allegedly submitted a variety of fraudulent documents to lenders in order to borrow money against properties purchased with overseas funds—funds that were never reported to the IRS. One reason prosecutors were able to build a paper trail against the pair: Manafort needed Gates's help to convert a PDF document to Word format and back again.

In 2016, Manafort allegedly wanted to create a fake profit-and-loss statement for his company, Davis Manafort Partners, in order to inflate his income and qualify for a loan.

"Manafort emailed Gates a .pdf version of the real 2016 DMI P&L, which showed a loss of more than $600,000," the indictment claims. "Gates converted that .pdf into a Word document so that it could be edited, which Gates sent back to Manafort. Manafort altered the Word document by adding more than $3.5 million in income."

Then, according to the indictment, Manafort "sent this falsified P&L to Gates and asked that the Word document be converted back to a .pdf, which Gates did and returned to Manafort."

By sending these documents back and forth by email, Manafort and Gates made it easy for prosecutors to pinpoint exactly who changed the documents and when.

In another incident earlier that same year, Manafort allegedly submitted another fraudulent profit-and-loss statement to a different lender with his firm's income inflated by $2 million. An employee at this lender, who was apparently aware of Manafort's ruse, replied back, "Looks Dr'd. Can someone just do a clean excel doc and pdf to me?"

"A subsequent version was submitted to the bank," the indictment says.

I'm hoping that in a future indictment against Manafort, Mueller is going to provide Manafort's internet search history complete with searches like "How do I launder money?" or "How do I commit bank fraud?"

I can't imagine how hard it would be to unravel everything they've done if they weren't, you know, incompetent. The one saving grace of this administration has been the comic levels of idiocy.

More than that, consider this: Mueller is probing Russian interference. I appreciate how that puts him in this wheelhouse, if he was looking for funneling through provision of property that is used to raise capital, but to have then stumbled up direct evidence of modifying profit and loss numbers in order to defraud a bank feels like it must have been so overt as to be obvious even when you're not really looking for it?

I love how the lender catches their crime, and then brushes it off. Oh you were forging that document and were too obvious about it? Sorry, please try again. I'll just pretend I didn't see that. Wink wink.

Word is now Gates is declining to cooperate. Assuming this evidence is what it is, he is doubling down on Trump going on a pardon frenzy.

The news on Gates keeps going back and forth. First he hires a lawyer known for making plea deals, then he fires all his other lawyers. Then he fires the lawyer known for making plea deals. Wait, no, maybe he didn't fire that lawyer? Now he's rumored to be close to making a plea deal. Nope, he's not making a plea deal.

I just want to know where this lands, but the path it's taking could go anywhere.

I love how the lender catches their crime, and then brushes it off. Oh you were forging that document and were too obvious about it? Sorry, please try again. I'll just pretend I didn't see that. Wink wink.

After 2008, it was clear that it's all taxpayer money they are gambling with anyway, not their own.

Word is now Gates is declining to cooperate. Assuming this evidence is what it is, he is doubling down on Trump going on a pardon frenzy.

The news on Gates keeps going back and forth. First he hires a lawyer known for making plea deals, then he fires all his other lawyers. Then he fires the lawyer known for making plea deals. Wait, no, maybe he didn't fire that lawyer? Now he's rumored to be close to making a plea deal. Nope, he's not making a plea deal.

I just want to know where this lands, but the path it's taking could go anywhere.

- Russia continues its own shenanigans in the US unopposed by the administration.

It is weirdly plausible. These things have been carried out more or less visibly so it's not like some "black op" people still don't know about. And the misinformation campaign isn't all that hidden either. Putin is in essence a mafia figure with nukes who continues to get away with stuff.

Word is now Gates is declining to cooperate. Assuming this evidence is what it is, he is doubling down on Trump going on a pardon frenzy.

The news on Gates keeps going back and forth. First he hires a lawyer known for making plea deals, then he fires all his other lawyers. Then he fires the lawyer known for making plea deals. Wait, no, maybe he didn't fire that lawyer? Now he's rumored to be close to making a plea deal. Nope, he's not making a plea deal.

I just want to know where this lands, but the path it's taking could go anywhere.

They're reporting today that he is taking the plea deal.

I've seen those reports too, but given how much ambiguity there's been on this, I wouldn't be surprised by a last-minute change of heart from Gates.

Word is now Gates is declining to cooperate. Assuming this evidence is what it is, he is doubling down on Trump going on a pardon frenzy.

The news on Gates keeps going back and forth. First he hires a lawyer known for making plea deals, then he fires all his other lawyers. Then he fires the lawyer known for making plea deals. Wait, no, maybe he didn't fire that lawyer? Now he's rumored to be close to making a plea deal. Nope, he's not making a plea deal.

I just want to know where this lands, but the path it's taking could go anywhere.

They're reporting today that he is taking the plea deal.

I've seen those reports too, but given how much ambiguity there's been on this, I wouldn't be surprised by a last-minute change of heart from Gates.

Word is now Gates is declining to cooperate. Assuming this evidence is what it is, he is doubling down on Trump going on a pardon frenzy.

The news on Gates keeps going back and forth. First he hires a lawyer known for making plea deals, then he fires all his other lawyers. Then he fires the lawyer known for making plea deals. Wait, no, maybe he didn't fire that lawyer? Now he's rumored to be close to making a plea deal. Nope, he's not making a plea deal.

I just want to know where this lands, but the path it's taking could go anywhere.

They're reporting today that he is taking the plea deal.

I've seen those reports too, but given how much ambiguity there's been on this, I wouldn't be surprised by a last-minute change of heart from Gates.

I think it's more likely that he simply can't afford to continue his defense and is running out of money.

Word is now Gates is declining to cooperate. Assuming this evidence is what it is, he is doubling down on Trump going on a pardon frenzy.

The news on Gates keeps going back and forth. First he hires a lawyer known for making plea deals, then he fires all his other lawyers. Then he fires the lawyer known for making plea deals. Wait, no, maybe he didn't fire that lawyer? Now he's rumored to be close to making a plea deal. Nope, he's not making a plea deal.

I just want to know where this lands, but the path it's taking could go anywhere.

They're reporting today that he is taking the plea deal.

I've seen those reports too, but given how much ambiguity there's been on this, I wouldn't be surprised by a last-minute change of heart from Gates.